Call it the CVS shuffle.
The new CVS Pharmacy and strip mall that’s replacing the beloved Kings Plaza Diner on Avenue U will also replace an older CVS a block and a half away on Flatbush Avenue, a spokesman for the pharmacy giant announced this week.
“We plan to open the [new] store in early 2012 and when it does our nearby store and all employees will relocate to the new site,” CVS spokesman Michael DeAngelis told us.
The news comes as a bit of relief to residents living in the pharmacy-saturated Marine Park.
“I don’t get it,” said Nicholas Savino as he walked by the blue construction fence and the notice advertising the new CVS between Coleman and Hendrickson streets. “Don’t we have enough of these?”
CVS has two pharmacies in the 11234 zip code: the one on Flatbush Avenue as well as one on Ralph Avenue between Avenues M and N.
But that’s not all: there are three Rite Aids, a Duane Reade and a Walgreens in the same zip code.
DeAngelis said the new store will be approximately 11,000 square feet — the minimum size of a mansion — and have parking as well as “additional space to sub-lease.”
Renderings at the project site show the CVS set back off Avenue U, with two or three other stores attached to it.
DeAngelis didn’t know what would happen with the Flatbush Avenue CVS once it closed.
“We do not own these properties,” he said. “We lease them.”
The Kings Plaza Diner served its last supper on Oct. 24, 2010, capping 35 years of satisfying the appetites of hungry Marine Park residents. The diner opened about a year after the mall opened, making it a perfect resting spot for mall weary — and hungry — shoppers.
Since its closure, diner owner Nick Stathos has been hinting about opening another eatery in the area, but has yet to do so.
